We have created such forms as political institutions and philosophy and history and economics and and companies and transportation and microwaves and cell phonesand TV sets and hearing aids and …………

But we have mistaken those forms of existence for existence....

We are not political institutions or historical or economicsor transportation or cell phones...…

we are human beings and all those other things we have created are not us...they are simply extensions of us..... we confused the things we have createdwith who we are.... when they are simply aids to us, not us...…

When I was young and I created.. it was a creation that was basic/plain/uncomplicated...…. as I grew older, my creations grew more complex,more difficult, with more moving parts...… now that I am old, my creations have simplified... less complex, less moving parts.....

Look at the path of artists.... they usually begin their creative processwith simple forms, basic/plain/uncomplicated, less moving parts.....artists in music, literature, sculpture, architecture, poetry...….

as they approach the middle stage of their creative process, their art, in whatever form it took, became more complex, more difficult,more moving parts....

and as Artists mature, they return to simple, less complex, less moving partsart.. regardless of the format of the art...…

Today, we are in the middle stages of the creative process and we are making our creations complicated, more difficult, with more moving parts.....

soon, soon we shall return to a simpler, less complicated form of creations...…… our art, our understanding of history, economics, science, philosophy, biology will begin to be less complicated,less moving parts, less difficult.....

that means as artist, and creations such as science and philosophyand history and biology is an act of creation such as any artist woulddo....we will come to a deeper understanding of what those disciplines actually mean and we can state them in a simpler, less complicated fashion...………. as we create, we find the lessons we learn can beturned into simpler language.....

Or as Einstein once stated, someone really knows his stuff if they can simplify it to the point of making it plain to anyone... that is when people really understand what they are talking about.....when they can make it plain and simple.... if they are still usingcomplicate language to make something understandable, they reallydon't understand it...……….So, do you understand something? Can you make it plain and simple for anyone to understand it?

That is the goal of understanding... to make it simple enough so we can explain it to anyone.... understanding to the point as being able to explain it to anyone......

do you understand?

Kropotkin

"Those who sacrifice liberty for securitywind up with neither." "Ben Franklin"

As an average person looking at the academic disciplines that wedepend upon such as history and economics and science and of course,philosophy, we see a complete lack of understanding of those disciplinesand a disregard of those disciplines. In other words, the common man/womenmight ask, what has those academic disciplines done for me? Do those academic disciplines help my life in any, way, shape or form? The common person most likely sees someone who engages in those disciplines as not much more then a "egghead", whatever that means, and they dismissanyone who engages in such matters as history and philosophy and political scienceand economics and...…….

The "average" person cannot make a connection with any of thoseacademic disciplines and see them as not much more then intellectual masturbation. The common person has no engagementor connection with such academic disciplines.

The common American is "practical" and they don't see any of those academic disciplines as being "practical". Americans have always disliked and distrusted "intellectuals". In Europe and Asia, intellectualshave a much higher level of respect then here in America.

Part of the slam against Clinton was, she was an intellectual who didn't connectwith people. As if connecting with people was a prerequest for being president.

Anyway, how do we get the "average" person to reconnect with such academic disciplines as political science and philosophy and history?

You have to connect the disciplines with what is happening in people's lifes. Why does philosophy matter? You have to show people why philosophy matters in their life? The dry philosophy of deconstruction and analytical philosophy doesn't tell people what they want to know about how to live life.

Or to be more exact, people don't see the issues in their life. In their quest to be "Practical" people miss the fact that theirlives are an empty shell. People are simply going through the motions in getting through life. Capitalism and democracy and the western way of life has failed. The promise that life would be betterunder this form of government and economics has failed...… but why has capitalism and democracy failed? That is a question the commonpeople don't grasp. They don't see how capitalism and democracy has failed. But the failure in both, stems from the same failure.

Both capitalism and democracy have money as it final judgment.Both are judge by profits and losses where as we must judge a political system and a economic system with a different judgement values. But these matters don't engage the average person,the average person simply wants the system to work and they don't carehow that happens or who is damaged in the rush to make the system work.

But that is the point, we should care not only if the system works,but how it influences people, for better or worse. The failure is not understanding that a system that works is still not the best systemto have. Success or failure is not just a matter of profits and losses,it is about the effect that system has on its citizens or the people withinthe system. We must make it clear that system understanding is really in the best interest of people. We have said for decades, let the experts do the thinking for you. And the experts have been in the pay of thosewho make the decisions and thus the decisions have benefited thosewho have paid for the "expert" opinions. The answer for me has always beensimple, the more people involved the better. Democracy or any political system works best the more people you have involved in it. Any economicsystem works best the more that the people benefit from it, not just the 1%. The answer is to increase participation in every area of our lives. That is how we get engagement from people. We engage them by getting them a voice, a place in the system. The academic disciplines can become part of our engagement with people by bringing the disciplines to the people, not just leave it in the hands of the "experts". Make philosophypart of peoples life by allowing them engagement with philosophy.

I believe in the wisdom of the people, the group more then I believe inthe wisdom of the few or the one.

Kropotkin

"Those who sacrifice liberty for securitywind up with neither." "Ben Franklin"

As usual, I return to existence for that is the basis for any thought or philosophy that we have.

Existence is something we work through and discover about,but existence also has an historical context that should be discussed.

Existence as punishment. Now I don't claim any of this is new or something different then what othershas thought of, but it is another attempt to make sense of it.

Buddhism and Christianity for example treat existence as punishment. Recall the Buddha and his teachings. The point of existence as to escape suffering and by becoming enlighten, we can escape the ongoing rebirth and death of life, reincarnation. We are ever being born and reborn andall the while, we suffer. We suffer as humans and we suffer as animalsand we suffer every time we return to this earth. To end the endlesscycle of being reborn, we must achieve Enlightenment. That will put an endto the constant cycle of rebirth and suffering. That philosophy/religionis anti-life. It is an attempt to end the suffering we have in life.

Christianity is also anti-life, but its opposition to life is of a different sort. The goal of life is not life but to rejoin with god in heaven. To join at the righthand of god and spend eternity in the reflection and contemplation of god. (this idea of the point of heaven is a direct steal from the Greek philosophers. They thought that life was best spent in the contemplation of existence and god)

Now recall the Medieval ages when man was anti-body and anti-life. Recall that many in the church felt the need to punish the body invarious actions such as in flagellation of the body for religious purposes. To deny the flesh was a major fixture of the medieval manand this denial carried over to even our time. Recall the programs directed to youth about abstentions. It worked until it didn't workand for the most part, abstention programs failed.

Today, we still have an feeling or idea that to deny the body pleasure is an positive behavior and not a negative behavior.This idea of abstention is still strong in conservatives but not so muchin liberals.

To deny the body and place primacy in the soul is still a fixture in our modern society. Jesus said:

"What does it profit a man if he gains the world and yet loses his soul"

so existence has many different aspects. For the religious, the body meansless then the soul. But we are body, we cannot deny that simple fact.

to paraphrase Jesus: "What does it matter for you to gain your soul ifyou lose your body"?

This entire debate hinges on one point, is the soul eternal? If the soul is eternal, then the religious is right but, but if the soul or what we think of as the soul, ends with death, then those who engage with the body over the soul is right.

As of this moment, there is no evidence that the soul or what we thinkof as the soul is eternal...….We have bodies, that much we know. but do we have eternal souls? I cannot subscribe to that point of view. For the simple reason, that I cannot discover anything that is eternal. Even the universe is finite. It began and in billions of years, it will end. Just as our solar system began at some point 14 billion years ago, it willend. As we humans beings began at some point and at some point, we end. I cannot find anything that last forever, is eternal.

And because we are finite beings, we must not only engage with the soul butwith the body. We must be in harmony and in moderation with both soul and body.

So we return to the original point, that of existence being a punishment. I cannot hold that point of view that existence is a punishment because existence is not just a punishment but something that has worthy pleasures and goals that make existence worth living. Life is not about suffering, it has suffering in it, but the main function of life is not to escape suffering, but life is to embraceand overcome our suffering and pain and despair and unhappiness.

we can turn any negative aspect of our life which is suffering and pain and despair and unhappiness into something positive andworth remembering. For suffering and despair and pain and unhappiness is part of this thing we call existence and it is a negative, a dark aspectof life..... but as in the two aspects of life, the light and the dark, light needs the dark to reveal the how lifegiving and astonishing the whatthe light shows us. For the dark needs the light to reveal that life is two parts,that of light and that of dark. To make sense of our existence, we need bothlight and dark. To understand our existence we must accept both the lightand the dark. The light part of existence which is beautiful and wonderful and uplifting and the dark part of existence which is the pain and sufferingand despair that each of us feels at some point in our life. We must have bothparts to help us appreciate what our life is and what is possible for us.

The exuberance of life is tempered by the realization of the negative, dark aspects of life which is the pain and suffering that accompanies life. We cannot just have the light part of life, we must, must have the dark side of life and that allows us to enjoy the beauty and promise and possibilities of life all the more.

So existence has two sides, the positive and light sideand the dark, negative side and we must have both tocorrectly understand what life is...…

Kropotkin

"Those who sacrifice liberty for securitywind up with neither." "Ben Franklin"

Certainty is found in the knowledge that life is both the light and the dark....... the positive and negative, or as the eastern religions mark it, the yin and yang of life...the "taichi" symbol... where opposite and often contrary forcesare often complementary, interconnected, interdependent.

It is not in the things, the material things that have certainty but in theprocess of life is certainty and what that means is simple,Life is a process. we are born, we live and we die....Every human being goes through that process. Some days are in the lightand some days are in the dark..... Yesterday was a really shitty day at workand some days are like that, dark days and perhaps my next day at work will be goodand it will exist in the positive, in the light.

the pain and suffering and death of both the Buddha and Christianity existsand the beauty and joy and wonder in life, also exists.

that is where the certainty of life exists, in the process of life.....

I will someday, die. I cannot escape that fact. My material body, the bodythat is called Kropotkin, will cease to exist. but my individual cells within mybody will go on and become part of something else. As my individual cells weresomething else before they became part of the material body known as Kropotkin.

We are finite and we are infinite, once again depending on how you look at it. If you just look at our current form of material being called a human being, then we are finite and soon, this form will cease to exist. But my cells, atoms,they last forever and were present at the begining of time and they willbe there at the end of time. Which Kropotkin do you look at? The finite oneor the infinite one? The positive one of the light or the negative one of the dark?

Or do you understand human beings as being part light and part dark?

We can find certainty in this universe, you just to stop thinking that certainty exists in a material matter or form. Certainty is a process in how we view ourselvesand each other. That is where certainty exists, not in the material objects themselves,but in the process that created the material objects.

Kropotkin

"Those who sacrifice liberty for securitywind up with neither." "Ben Franklin"

In thinking about the need for obedience, we must be obedient to the state, to the church, to god, for the Jewish people, they must beobedient to the religious laws of their forefathers.

If there was a trait to mark the modern age, it would be obedience. But the question of obedience means we no longer "obey" or understandthe question of the Enlightenment which is basically a call for people tothink for themselves. As Kant said about the entire Enlightenment,

"Sapare aude"

which is a Latin phrase meaning, "Dare to know". And that phrase did sum upthe entire Enlightenment thought and goals. Dare to know. But the modernpoint of view of obedience at all cost, rejects these phrase and the thoughtbehind it..... the modern world is about knowing exactly what the state wantsyou to know and no more..... if there was a modern phrase to match the entireagenda of the modern age, it would be this,

"need to know basis"

that is the one phrase that is the modern version of "Sapere aude".....everyone is on a "need to know" basis and the average citizendoesn't need to know anything outside of what the state tells them and once again the greatest crime anyone can commit is to violatethis "need to know" order and reveal information that was a "need to know".....

This disobedience will get someone years in prison.... to violate the State agenda which is to hold and maintain all relevant and pertinent information which the state decides is relevant and pertinent. In other words, in regards tothe "need to know" basis, the state is judge, jury and executioner...… the statelays out the rules, the program and the punishment for any crimes of "disobedience" of the state mandated by the "need to know" basis.

The enlightenment fight was just another version of the "need to know" fightwe are experiencing today. But their battle in regards to the "need to know" was a battle against the authority of such institutions like the church, or authorities like Aristotle or St. Augustine. The Enlightenment wassaying, don't just accept the authority of church or Aristotle, dare to know yourself. And the same can be said today, it is not enoughthat we accept the authority of the state and simply bow downto their "need to know" basis. Under the guise of authority of the state, the state can and has limited our access to information and knowledge thatthe state "claims" will somehow damage the state in some fashion.....but if this is a democracy, then as the people who govern, we have a right,indeed a absolute right to access that information...…

let us take an concrete example, the FBI investigation into Kavanaugh that was done this last week is being held on a "need to know" basis and the Americanpeople apparently don't need to know...…. but, but if information is being heldfrom the American people, then how are we to make "informed" decisions asto our choices when we vote. In other words, a world that is a "need to know"world is anti-democratic for it excludes the very people that are supposed tobe in charge, the people. The vital phrase is simply this,

"government of the people, for the people and by the people"

and if we operate with government done on a "need to know" basis andthe people don't need to know, then we don't have a democracy....we have something else in which we don't have

"government of the people, for the people, by the people".

If actions are taken in the name of the people, such as military,governmental, political and done with a "need to know" basisthen we have a dictatorship. For if the people have no say and no knowledgeof said actions taken in their name, those actions are not done in our nameand without our consent. Those actions are done bythe consent and knowledge of the "leadership" of our country but not the peopleand thus are illegal. If the people do not have a say in or even knowledge of actions taken in their name, then it is not done for the people. It is donefor the benefit of those who are in charge... The ones who "need to know".

For example after 9/11, we "the people" were forced without our consent,to have TSA examine our persons and go through our luggage and take offour shoes, belt, and have all other material go through a screening machine....if it is done without our consent, it is illegal. Does the safety of the people override the fact that we still live in a democracy and we must, must, must consent to actions taken in our name. For if actions are taken in my name, then I am responsible for those actions because they were done in my name.

This same theory can be established for religion especially Christianity.for I have not given my consent to god for actions taken in my name.

The concept of consent is suppose to be the basis of our modern world and yet, what consent have you ever given to either government or the churchor even god? I submit that part of the "modern condition" that afflicts the modern age,lies in this problem, the fact, that so much of our modern age is done withoutconsent or permission of the people in whose name the actions are taken.

If I have liability for my actions taken, then I must have some consent, somesay in accepting that liability... I cannot be forced to accept liability for something I never accepted or consented to and yet, the modern stateand the church and god forces me to accept liability for actions takenwhen I never accepted or agreed to or choose or consented to.

and one solution I would advocate is this, at 18 or 21 as the case maybe, I would stand people in front of a judge or in a written statement,to publicly give consent to, to voluntarily choose to becomemembers of our society and state. To allow people the option togive consent to the actions taken in their name and by this consent,they earn the right to become one of the "need to know" basis.

If we are a democracy, then we must actually begin to act like it.We must make participation in society and the state part of beinga member of said society/state. the entire point of democracy is tohave people have a say in matters of concern to their lives, be it politically or economically or socially. To be a democracy demandsparticipation by those people in whose name actions are taken. If I am going to be liable to pay taxes for warships and bombsand nuclear weapons, then I deserve a voice in the processand I deserve to make consent to those actions.....

Now one might say that that consent will create chaos and confusion within society? but what is the point of democracyif we have no voice or consent in actions taken in our name?

Either we have a democracy and we have a voice and give consentto actions taken in our name or we don't have a democracy, inwhich case we don't have a voice or give our consent to actions,certainly not taken in our name, but taken by the leaders in theirname and their consent, for their benefit, not ours.

The bottom line is coming to a head. Do we have a democracy or don't we?

That is the modern question. Do we have a real, live, operating democracythat is

"of the people, for the people, by the people"

or don't we?

Kropotkin

"Those who sacrifice liberty for securitywind up with neither." "Ben Franklin"

The constitution and the declaration of independence were quiteclear in their answer, freedom. Regardless of the question, the answer was, is and always will be, freedom. The reason seems to be clear as to why. But let us take security first. As we know, no matter how hard we try, we cannot ever be 100% secure. There is no such thing as absolute security. As we know from our understanding of systems, that no system is 100% anything.

An example of this is with energy. No matter how hard we try, we cannotget an energy system to be 100% efficient. That in every system, we can only have a percentage of the system use energy efficiently. There is and will alwaysbe inefficiency in a engine for example. So what this means for example, is the relationship between the total energy contained in the fueland the amount of energy used to perform useful work. Most gasoline engines are only about 20% efficient. Which means that the engine "waste"80% of the energy possible in gasoline. The human body is about 25% efficientand a Iowa cornfield is only 1.5% percent efficient at converting incoming sunlightinto chemical storage.

So we understand that in systems, that they are not 100% efficient, and this is true in any attempt of a system, a person trying to be secure,that he/she cannot ever, regardless of the energy put into their security,ever be 100% safe and secure. It is simply not possible.

So let us look at freedom. We cannot ever have 100% of freedom.In other words, we do not have absolute freedom. We can have a percentage of freedom, but never absolute freedom. Our actions are limited by various limitations, we cannot have bodily freedom becausewe are biological creatures and that creates limitations in our bodily freedom. I can only run as fast as my body will allow me. I am limited in that aspect. I am not free to fly by just flapping my arms. I amlimited by the rules/laws of the physical universe. I am not free to actwith impunity regarding the laws of the universe. I cannot escape the laws/rulesof physics and evolution and gravity. I cannot be free to grow wings nor am I free to float upwards on the earth because gravity is holding medown. Nor can I travel the speed of light. My range of actions is limitedby the rules/laws of the universe. I cannot have freedom of actions.

So we know that there are limitations to both security and freedom. What else can we understand about security and freedom.

Security is trying to make us safe from something. Security is going away from something. It is negative in nature. You are trying to escape harm by making oneself "secure". It is a fool's attempt.

so, what is freedom? Freedom is not going from something, but is goingtoward something. I want to be free to act in some fashion. It is positive. There are limitations in what I can be free in and how I can be free, but stillit is striving toward something. I am trying to be free to...…….

This is why we must engage in freedom over security. Freedom is aboutgoing toward something and security is escaping from something.

The attempt to freedom causes chaos and violence andupheaval. Oh, yes it does, but since we cannot ever become 100%safe and secure, we should work toward the positive actions and positive results. The search for freedom is a dance, a celebrationof what is possible and the search for security?

that is a reaction to fear and the opposite of the reason for seeking freedom. The drive to seek freedom is far different thenthe drive to find secuity.........the drive toward freedom is far riskierand far more dangerious and full of traps to ensnare the unsuspecting human being, but, but the drive for freedom is a positive action inour lives and the drive for security is a negative drive in our lives.

the young person wants freedom, the old person wants security. Who do you want to be?

Kropotkin

"Those who sacrifice liberty for securitywind up with neither." "Ben Franklin"

Security is the search for a certainty that does not exist, freedom is the search for possibilities, not certainty.

in our search for freedom we sacrifice certainty,and in our search for security, we sacrifice our possiblities of becoming.

In security, we no longer are overcoming, we are safe and set in the actof security....we only seek to be safe in security, we no longer attempt tobecome something more..... we are done with what drives life and that is the act of overcoming who we are. We accept the habits and biases and myths and prejudices and superstitions of our society, our upbringing,our indoctrinations. We no longer seek to overcome our childhood indoctrintations because in our search for security, the only thing that matters is our safety andsecurity. Nothing else matters outside of those things that make us "safe" and "secure".

It is by freedom that we engage with the overcoming of "who we are" and the search "to know thyself", and when I know myself, I can then discover what values I have been indoctrinated with and then overcomethose values by accepting the values that are the real me, become who I am,in regards to the values that really matter to me, not the values I was indoctrinated with,but the values that are the "real" me. The search to be human is the search for the values that are the real you, not the indoctrinated values of childhood.the search for those values require, no demand, not security, but freedom.

To become who we are and to overcome our childhood indoctrinations,means we must have freedom to engage with knowing ourselves.

Thus freedom is a more acceptable path then security because it allowsus the opportunity to become who we are.

Kropotkin

"Those who sacrifice liberty for securitywind up with neither." "Ben Franklin"

a look at our founding fathers, they didn't emphasize safety or security,they said, come to America for its freedom/liberty. You didn't move to the frontier to be safe and secure, you went to the wilderness to befree. The very basis of America was in its freedom, not in its safety orsecurity. People left their homeland and traveled thousands of miles to findfreedom, not safety or security. We have lost what made America greatwhich was its promotion of the ideal of freedom, not the ideal of security.to gain security, you must sacrifice freedom and I am not willing to sacrifice the values that made America great to gain some vague hope of safety or security.

The risk to find freedom/liberty exists but the danger to surrender our freedom to find security is far too great.

I am willing to follow the founding fathers and sacrifice some security inreturn for greater freedom. It is in freedom that we find ourselves and in security we lose ourselves.

Kropotkin

"Those who sacrifice liberty for securitywind up with neither." "Ben Franklin"

That we live in a nihilistic culture and state cannot be denied,for evidence see the nomination of Kavanaugh in congress.

From the start of the 20th century to today, has been a lesson inNihilism. The First world war, the Holocaust, the second world war......each event is evidence of our nihilism, the negation of human beingsin the pursuit of money/profits, that is a perfect example of our current nihilism.

But it is not enough to say, no, the GOP is the party of no and the extremist party of nihilism. We cannot just negate our way into better lives.at some point, we must affirm, we must say yes. The negation and nihilismof society cannot hold, the center cannot hold, the man said and why?Because the center is the negation of humans and their values.The core of modern society today is negation and nihilism and we cannotmantain that and expect to excel or succeed in our lives.

But what do we affirm? To what do we say yes to?

It is not enough to pursue profit/money to the exclusion/negationof humans and their values. We must affirm, say yes to those valuesthat make life worth living. It is in the yes/the affirmation of the values of justice and peace and love and hope and charity....it is in those values that we begin to see what it means to be human,truly human. To negate, to deny is to say no to what it means to be human.To accept those negative values of hate, anger, lust, greed, meanness, is to negate, to deny what is best human beings.

To negate is nihilism. Another value we must say yes to is freedom. And to seek freedom is to seek uncertainty and chaos and disorder, but understand this, freedom is an antidote to nihilism. Seeking freedommeans saying yes instead of negation or denying.

There are some who call America, the Welfare state, but that is not true.In reality, we are a "martial state", we are a "nihilistic state", we are the "safe and secure state". But we are clearly not a "freedom state", for in our pursuit of security, we have negated, denied freedom as being antagonistic to security/safety.

I for one would eliminate the police state that we have today andand I would eliminate the NSA and CIA and FBI. But Kropotkin, you would open us to danger, my life would be in danger. If you don't have freedom, you don't have a life anyway. If you favor security over freedom, you are negating, participating in nihilism. In a choice between freedom and security, there is no choice,you must choose freedom, for otherwise you choose nihilism.

Kropotkin

"Those who sacrifice liberty for securitywind up with neither." "Ben Franklin"

Hegel early in his career wondered about a problem, which may be instructive these days.

He often wrote about how to bring about a moral and spiritual renewal and thus lead to social reform.

Hegel considered that is what Jesus did in the corrupt Greco-Roman world of the 1st century. He felt that Jesus brought about a moral and spiritual renewal that was needed becausethe Greco-Roman world was the last stages of a long period of a civilizationthat could be traced to the Egyptians and thus lasting for 3000 years and that civilization was in dire need of renewal.

And what of us, do we after 500 years of the "modern" world, arewe in need of a moral and spiritual renewal? If we follow the GOPand declare America a nihilistic zone in which the only values that matteris money/profits, then yes, yes we are in need of moral and spiritual renewal.

If we follow the founding fathers and make the search to be about freedom,then no, we are not in need of a moral/spiritual renewal. What values do you make as your priority values, determine if we/you are in need of a moral/spiritual renewal. If the values you fight for are values that negate or deny humans or human values, then you are in need of a moral/spiritual renewal. But the only way to know is to begin the process of knowing thyself.Engage in self reflection about what values are important to you and are thosevalues that are important to you, are they your values or are they the valuesthat were indoctrinated into you as a child? If they are indoctrinated values as I suspect most people values are values of indoctrination and not personallydiscovered values. Then you must engage in a discovery of what values are reallyyour values. You must overcome the indoctrinated values of childhood and discover what are your values and then the final step is to becomewho you are by making those newly discovered values, your values. when you are engaged with values that are your values and not indoctrinatedvalues then you have become who you are. But the only way to find out if you need or if society needs to be morally and spiritually renewed, is byreflection and awareness and understanding, what are the values that I haveand that my society has and are they really values worth holding?

It is this engagement that leads us to become truly human.

One might ask, Kropotkin, what about you? Does society need to be morallyand spiritually renewed? As I have made fairly clear, we live in a nihilisticsociety because we hold money/profits above people and their values, so yes, we most certainly need a moral and spiritual renewal.

And where should I, Kropotkin begin?

As always, I begin with me and I try to understand my values andif the values I hold are indoctrinated values of my childhood or are the values I hold really values I have discovered for myself?

As I have changed political views and philosophical views multiple times, I can state with some degree of "certainty" that I have cometo my currently held views with a inner dialogue with myself.

A inner dialogue that must be honest and open and without fear. And I have done that to the best of my abilities and I am calmwithout fear and with hope because I am comfortable with my valuesand with who I am. I have no need of crutches like religion or phonyvalues that are nihilistic like materialism and the modern pursuit ofand prayer to the god, Mammon.

Kropotkin

"Those who sacrifice liberty for securitywind up with neither." "Ben Franklin"

this question of moral and spiritual renewal requires some understanding of what needs to be renewal. In other words, what actions/behavior or beliefs do we need to reform to accomplish some sort ofmoral or spiritual renewal. What are we doing wrong that needs to be reformed and nenewed?

That we must begin by understanding what we are doing. As I have noted, we are a martial, warlike society whereasour moral document of a government budget is directed todefense and security. That we put so much emphasis on military and defensive tells us what our priorities are.

that we spend our days working and promoting the religion of materialism, the buying and selling of goods, gives us anotherclue as to our priorities.

Remove those two aspects and what is left?

Actually, not much. So any understanding of what it means to have a moral and spiritual renewal must come from these twoaspects of our life. The renewal must come from our staunch and dedicated beliefs in making security and materialismour guiding principles in life. This renewal comes about because security denies/negates freedom for true security can onlycome about with the denial of freedom. The aspect of materialism denies that our happiness can come from anything but the buying and selling of goods and money/profits.

The pursuit of happiness spoken by the enlightenment documentslike the Declaration of Independence,

……."that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienableRights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness"

And we take the pursuit of happiness to be the materialism, the buying and selling of goods/money/profits.

But this enlightenment document is wrong. The pursuit should not beafter happiness, because that path leads us to the wrong goal. The pursuit should be of values that give our live meaning and purpose. Values like justice, dignity, tolerance, love, charity, honor, freedom...…….. those values, these are the values we should pursue,not materialism or the futile pursuit of safety or security.

So the pursuit of values that give life meaning is the moral andspiritual renewal that we need. But we do not act or operate in isolation, by ourselves. We exist within a society/culture,a system as it were and only by existing within a society/culturethat we need or have use of morals or the spiritual aspect of life.

It is within a society that we need to be moral or spiritual, individually we have no such need. Morality/spirituality are collective aspects of our life. they must be shared withinthe family, the state, the culture and the society.

It is because homo sapiens are social creatures thatwe need morals or the spiritual. So any renewal must occur both individually and, AND collectively. We mustthink about this moral and spiritual renewal in termsof the individual and society. We collectively must engage in a moral/spiritual renewal.

So what values are values that we should individually and collectively have? The same values I would think,and the reason for that is simple, if we as individualshave one set of values and society has another set of values,that means we are alienated from society..... For thatis what alienation really means, that the individual hasone set of values and society has another set of values.

If I am set upon freedom as my primary value and society is set upon security or materialism as its set/primaryvalue, then I am alienated from my society. Alienationis a question of values and the difference in values between the individual and society.

As I have laid out the quest to become who you are individually,this approach also exists for a society. the society must begin by knowing itself. Knowing what values are inherited, indoctrinatedwithin society itself. then the society just as an individual finds outas they begin the journey to understanding which always beginby beginning the process of knowing thyself. Then the society begins to understanding what values are really the values that a society should hold, overcoming the values thathave been inherited or indoctrinated within society. And then, then the society after overcoming itself, can become who it is when its values match the realityof that society. We are alienated from our society becauseindividually, we hold different values then the society holds.

and we must match our values, individually and collectively.To become who we are... our values individually must matchour collective values. And here is where the conflict withinsociety has been in the modern age. In the modern age,what have we been striving for? to be better citizens andengaging in materialism, the buying and selling of goods/money/profits. We have also adapted the universal commandment about disobedience. That is the greatest crime in modern society, to be disobedient to society, to our overlords, the modern corporation.

Therein lies the modern conflict between individual values and the collectivevalues of the modern dictatorship of the modern corporation. The modern corporation is about the negation/denial of humans and theirvalues and the individual values are about justice or love or charity. Values which have no value in the modern conception of what values are,in other words, the values of the corporation are nihilistic values and the values of the individual are positive/ lifegiving valuesand this conflict is what the modern society has been fighting aboutfor almost 200 years.

so we now see that our moral and spiritual renewal really is aboutmaking our societal/ cultural/ collective values match our individual values. So how do we match our individual value of justice with the societies values of obedience and materialism.

That is the question of our moral and spiritual renewal. How do we match individual values with the collective corporation values of nihilism? Recall that disobedience is the greatestcrime in modern society even by asking such questions, we are disobeyingsociety and the corporations that run our modern society.

Even by asking if materialism/capitalism is the value we should liveby is basic disobedience to modern society because the values of materialism/capitalism is considered to be so fundamental to society existence as to be unquestioned and unchallenged.

To doubt that materialism/capitalism is the value that we should pursue isto commit heresy.. and heresy in modern society for it is forbidden to holdany disobedience to the cult of materialism/capitalism. For disobedience to materialism/capitalism is really a religious crime because we aresuppose to accept the materialistic/capitalistic on faith, without question. Our modern belief in materialism/ capitalism is really religious faith basedupon taking the faith upon the authorities who have given their blessing tothe faith/religion of materialism/capitalism.

So the question of a moral/spiritual renewal must begin with the religiousquestion of our faith in materialism/capitalism.

Kropotkin

"Those who sacrifice liberty for securitywind up with neither." "Ben Franklin"

I am on vacation this week and have been spending it reading. As is my usual habit, when beginning a new philosopher, I reada biography about them and as I am beginning Hegel, I am readinga biography by Terry Pinkard called surprising enough, "Hegel" a biography.

And I note that as with virtually all the philosophers I have encountered so farin the modern era, from Descartes to Hegel, that they are really philosophersof and for and by other philosophers. In other words, the works that theyhave produced for the most part is written for other philosophers and notfor the average person on the street. Take Kant for example, after reading 12 books by and about him, I still don't understand his philosophical idea's. It hasn't beenfor a lack of trying, but his idea's have no bearing on the average person on the street. His philosophy has no bearing on anything an average person thinksor does and that is not going to help us trying to get an understanding of the point and purpose of our existence. Kant's gobblegook doesn't help me become a better person or understand life better or help me understand my place in the universe or even understand the Kantian questions:

What am I to do? What should I hope for? What can I know?

I cannot relate what Kant wrote with the questions he asked. And Kant is not alone in his failure to make his philosophy assessible for the man on the street. Hegel makes the same mistakesand in even worse language, if that is even possible. The mistake of having language hide what is being said instead of using language to helpunderstand what is being said. If philosophy is to help people understandtheir place in the universe, then the philosophical language must be understandable, even to the average person. It is not until Kierkegaard thatphilosophical language becomes plainer and even then, Kierkegaardtried to hide his meaning through various tricks like third person useof language and pseudonyms and pretend editors of his works.

This use of language to hide, obscure what is being said, to my mind anyway,is meant to show us that the author meaning is so brilliant that us commonminds is unable to understand it. However I would suggest that the languagebeing used is to make us think that the author is somehow way above us,but in fact, the author is really hiding the fact that his knowledge is for show and a pretension to brilliance. If you can't make your languageplain, then why bother? If is a matter of instruction that you make your presentation, then make your idea's clear and concise, so peoplecan learn from you...……..If is your intention to show us how smartyou are, then obscure language is your path to this goal. I believe this urge to pretension is, in part, why philosophy has such a bad/noreputation these days. Philosophy can show us our place and our meaning in the universe, but it has got to become of the people, for the people, by the people. Philosophy can be rigorous even usingplain, common language. If we want to return philosophy to the "Queen of the Sciences" then philosophy must speak to those whoneed it most and in language that they can understand.

Kropotkin

"Those who sacrifice liberty for securitywind up with neither." "Ben Franklin"

In my reading of "modernity" and "postmodernism" I've come acrossone concept that that has piqued my interest and I've commentedupon it before, the fragmentation of modern man.Goethe commented on this when he said, "Alas, I have two soulsin my breast". And the modern man says, dam, I wish I only had two souls. The modern man's soul has been fragmentated like a mirror or cup that has been dropped from a great height. But that mirrors our understanding of physics and how the universeworks...…. Once our understanding of the universe was Newtonian.Which is really the clockwork nature of the universe and how it all flowedall together under the great laws of Newton and Math. Under Newton, there was no fragmentation. Everything had its place and that placecould be found by the laws of science and math. The clock was reallythe symbol of the age of the enlightenment because everything was defined by its place in the universe and that was as sure asas how direct and clear the clock worked.

But the age of the enlightenment occurred before the modern age,before the industrial revolution. The age of the industrial revolutionalso adopted the clock as its symbol but not the clock that stands upon your desk, but as the timepiece that measures all activities. Recallthat saying, "Time is money". That is a indication of the idea thatthe industrial revolution took as its chief symbol the timeclock uponwhich all workers must time in and out of everyday...…

We are seen in the modern age as workers and only as workers. What is THE modern symbol of our industrial age? Work. We are determined and judge and measured by the work we do. What is virtually the first question you ever ask of someone you first meet? What do you do? What is your job. And then we judge them based on thatcriteria. Not is they are good people or honest people or just people, butdo they work and what is that work? And we then judge their honestyand value as an individual based on the criteria of their employment.

But the fragmentation comes from the fact that we are so much more thenjust working individuals. We attempt, in our own way, to answer the Kantian/Kropotkin question of "what can I know? What am I to do? What values should I hold? among other such questions.

And in our search for our answers to the Kantian/Kropotkin questions,we discover ourselves to be greater then just our work status. We are notjust the sum of what we do for a living. We are so much more and this isthe crisis of the modern age. We are fragmented because we are seen asonly workers (and consumers) but as nothing else which flies in the face ofwho we are. In our own self analysis, Know thyself, we find ourselves to be holders of values but these values are in conflict with the modern age demand, that all we are is workers. I hold values that are being negated and devalued in the modern world pursuit of profits/money. I am fragmented because of this conflict between the nihilism of the modern world which is attempting to crush all values that don't leadto profits/money and my need to hold values like honesty, justice, truth, love. If I am to fit into the modern age, I must also negate and deny my values because they don't lead to profits/money. This is the fragmentation of the modern age. If I am to fit into the modern age, I must deny and negate who I am and my values. Either you accept the modern proposition that profit is the basis of existence or you don't and if you don't, you are committing thegreatest crime of the modern age..... and that is disobeying, disobedience. Just like Adam and Eve, you are committing thecrime that will have you removed from "paradise".

I don't accept the premise that the value of human beings comefrom the creation of profits/money. Simple as that and with that, I am in conflict with my age, I am alienatedfrom my age, I am fragmented. So now the question becomes,like the broken cup, can I be repaired? Can I be made whole againor must I suffer from my fragmentation till the end of my existence? From this we can now see the demand for the search for wholeness that dominates our age. But the fact is, we may not be able toput humpty dumpty together again. Think of it this way, are we the single individual atoms that society/the modern agehas created or are we part of a whole? And if we are part of the whole,which whole shall we be part of? Hence we now see or have an explanationfor the various ism's and ideologies that have dominated the modern age.For the rise of ism's and ideologies come from the fragmentation of the modernage and our attempt to make ourselves whole again with a return to such ism's as nationalism and religion and such idiocy as "white is right".I see such attempts to ism's as a response to the fragmentationof the modern age.

We have been torn asunder because of the industrial revolution whichhas devalued and negated humans and their values and we respondas best we can to reuniting our fracture souls with ism's and ideologiesthat seem to be able to reunite who we are into one soul...…

but is that even desirable? Should we even want to reunite into one soul, be it in the name, the ism of nationalism or religion or racism and bigotry? Should we attempt to reunite our souls or shouldwe attempt to conquer who we are and accept that we are individual soul, individual atoms who cannot become part of any false ism or ideology?

The universe itself offers us an answer. We know that the baseof the universe is individual atoms. That is the basic structureof the universe, the atom. But we also see atoms combining intostructures like the TV set and stoves and human beings and thenthe atoms come apart, entropy, and then the atoms come together again into a new structure. The number of atoms in the universehas never changed since the second of the big bang to todayand it will never change till the end of time. We are just individual atoms but we also change combine into structures and still be individual atoms. Thus as individual atoms, we can becomepart of structures like democracy and socialism and work and, and we change and adapt, we can dissociate ourselves, as individualatoms, and become part of other structures like dictatorshipsand capitalism. These structures, like giant Lago logs, are made up of many, thousands, indeed, millions of individualLago logs. but we have free will, we have the ability to dissociate ourselves as we want from our created social structureslike communism and Catholicism, or to join other created social structuresor institutions like the party of treason, the GOP.

That is where we have freedom. to join or to dissociate ourselvesfrom created structures of ism's and ideologies like monarchy or anarchism.

The path to becoming who we are is by understanding weare individual atoms, each and every single one of us, but we can join or dissociate ourselves from created social structuresthat are created to harbor and help us individual atoms to survive.

The key is to accept us as individual atoms and the use that understanding to accept our fractured souls. The fracturing of our souls is because we now understand that our social structure of modernism, capitalism and the industrial revolution,has fractured our soul with its nihilism/negation of who we are and what is possible by its relentless search for profits/money.

We are individual atoms.... the question becomes, what is next?

Kropotkin

"Those who sacrifice liberty for securitywind up with neither." "Ben Franklin"

OK, when last seen, I ask a simply question, as individual atoms, what is next?

But let us understand how we connect as individual atoms.

We know that in the beginning, the big bang, that the universewas a random series of atoms. What connected them was a force,that force, we call Gravity. The begining of the collection of matter, or thought of another way, the unification of atoms, into matter that we nowcall stars, planets, galaxies, space/time, all began because of gravity.

So, today we exist as a collection of individual atoms, we call cells.this collection of billions and trillions and whatever is the next largest number called, how did that collection of cells become, the human being?

We call this evolution. So matter began to collect as a response to Gravityand became planets and stars and galaxies. We responded to Gravity in the sameway and we began to collect as individual atoms. Then after billions of years,we began to be life, as we know it today. The path to the human being beganwith the collection of random cells that, for whatever reason, became life.

Just as the organizing principle of matter is gravity, the organizing principleof life is evolution. And as it does with Gravity, evolution goes from the smalland simple to the large and complex. We are not the last stage of evolution,we are simply what has come to now and after us, life will continue, byusing such organizing principles of evolution and gravity, to continue to build and create life into a collection of individual atoms. The next super powerof life on earth after the disappearance of human beings, may well be the common dog or rats or alligators or some other random collection of individual atoms that, by evolutionary means rise to the top of the food chain. Life is created by some means we don't yet understand, and frankly it doesn't matter,but life is maintain by evolution...…. we are individual atoms that has our organizing principles as evolution. We exist as a collection of individual atoms just as the sunand planets and galaxies are a collection of individual atoms and they are organizedby gravity. So as we are created by the "laws" of evolution, we must organizein a certain fashion. We are social creatures, we must congregate together,we human beings and this is because that is how evolution created us. The rules, think of evolution as rules, and we humans must obey the rules. And part of the rules for human beings is we must be social. That is inbornwithin us as part of the rules for being human. So as individual atoms,part of the rules for us individual atoms is we must congregate togetherand so the social order of families and towns and cities and social organizationslike government and culture and ism's and ideologies like communism and democracyexist because of the rules of evolution which demands, yep, demandsthat we socialize together and exist together and live together. So this is whyas individual atoms, we tend to congregate into social structures like familiesand groups. But we have freedom and part of that freedom is to associate or as the case maybe, disassociate ourselves from a particular social ordersuch as a family or group or ism or ideology. Now seen this way, the real path of freedom claimed by many is really just our ability to associateor dissociate from any social structure. We have the right as given by evolution, to dissent from and disagree with any social structurethat we, as individual atoms, agree with or disagree with.

We are determined by such factors as being inborn with certainevolutionary forces such as the need to survive and the need tobe social. This need to survive is strong in all evolutionary/biologystructures we call animals or living beings such as fish and plantsand algae... That is the inbred function of evolution, to createcertain conditions of individual atoms, of which the will to surviveis strong. We as a collection of individual atoms, living in a universeof collected atoms, both big and small, and the biological atomshave as part of their code, the need to survive.... for that is writtenwithin atoms by evolution, the need to survive. Recall that a cell,a single, individual cell has as it basis, the coding written intoit by the force of evolution and we know that code as DNA and RNA.That is the code that billions of years of evolution has writteninto all biological cells...……

We cannot, as of yet, override those codes, but that is part of whatwe are doing with our work with genetics and the study of genes andheredity in living organisms. Seeing how evolution has wired usas biological beings with DNA and RNA. So within us, as part of our individual cells, is the coding of evolution and as we are alsopart of that coding, we exist as being coded by evolution andall life is by being life, coded by evolution. So as gravity hasorganized matter into such things as stars and planets and galaxies,evolution has organized matter into biological/coded individual atoms which given enough time become more and more complicateand eventually turning into us, not the final chapter of evolution, simplethe next chapter of evolution and after us, will come another chapter and another and another. Life goes on...… with or without us.

With this in mind, what is next?

Kropotkin

"Those who sacrifice liberty for securitywind up with neither." "Ben Franklin"

As have understood ourselves to be a collectionof individual atoms that has united under the forces ofgravity and evolution. We have both forces boundwithin our own evolutionary growth. We are made of both gravity and evolution. That is part of who we areand you cannot remove or dissociate oneself from thoseforces any more then you can remove your heart, as a physicalentity that moves your blood around your body. If you remove your heart, you die. It is just that simple. But let us understand the heart in the symbolic method that the heart is understood,as an symbol of love and emotion. The creation of love and emotionand passion comes from the evolution of the biological form we call human beings. It is as much a part of us as the heart is a physical muscle that pumps blood for us..... To state the obvious, you cannot live withoutthe heart as a physical function because it is part of us, as the brain andliver and bones and sinew are also a part of us...… but as we cannotlive without the heart as a physical force that moves blood, we cannot livewithout the heart as an symbolic force either. In other words, we arecreated by evolution to have emotions, to love, to engage with passionand we cannot remove those emotions, love, passion inside of us.....They exist just as surely as the heart and brain exists and for the samereason, they somehow allow us to survive, which as you recall is oneof the patterns evolution has written into our genetic code... All physicalforms created by evolution, has written into it, the will to survive.It is part of the coding evolution has written into us and emotion, passion and love is also written into us as genetic coding.

We cannot separate out from us emotions, passions, love any more thenwe can separate out our heart or our brain. This is something we needto learn. Is that we can separate or associate ourselves with ism's and ideologies and specific social structures, but we cannot because of ourevolutionary coding escape being part of social structures or escapebeing emotional, passionate, loving..... This is the failure of the school of thought that says we must divest ourselves ofemotions, passions, love. We can no more divest ourselves ofthat which is coded in us then anymore we can divest ourselvesof our heart or our brain as physical structures that allow us to live.

The 20th century is a lesson in our attempt to follow the enlightenment of the 18the century and become only rational,logical. We cannot divest ourselves of our feelings, passions, love,emotions anymore then we can divest ourselves of our rationality, logical side of us as that is also written into us as genetic coding.

so our genetic coding, has us being both rational and logicaland passionate and emotional and loving. We must acceptthis basic fact and learn to work with both sides of our geneticheritage, the brain as a symbol and the heart as a symbol.

We cannot deny or negate either side of our genetic heritage without real problems and those real problems threaten our very survival. We must learn to work with the rational,logical side of us and work with the emotional, passionate sideof us.... The two sides, because they were created by evolution,are a fixed and always present part of us and we must exist with bothintact and working. This is part of the challenge of being human, learning to work with and be part of both the rational and emotional side of the evolutionary forces that created us. We must work withour rational side and our emotional side of us just as we must work with the forces that created the universe, matter in the lawsof gravity and living, biological matter, evolution. We must finda work to exist and work with gravity and evolution as they are the forces that are a part of us, exist within us and we cannot escapethe forces of gravity or evolution any more then we can escape theevolutionary forces of rational thought and emotional feelings.

It is within us, part of us and we must deal with that as best we can.We have no choice, so we must incorporate both factions of the evolutionary process that is rationality and emotionality.

so the path to becoming human, fully human lies in learning toincorporate both sides of the evolutionary coding that existswithin us, emotions and rational thought. so, you want to become a better human being and a better living being, the answer lies in incorporating the two sides of our genetic coding,the emotional and the rational.

Kropotkin

"Those who sacrifice liberty for securitywind up with neither." "Ben Franklin"

When all you have is a hammer, then every problem looks like a nail...…

And within this quote you have the modern world..... for people think all they have is a hammer, which is the ism's and ideologies that they are committed to, be it capitalism or Catholicism or nationalism. For example, if all you use to make judgements is profits and losses,then every example you look at, will involved profits and losses. This lack of imagination allows us to think that we can judge everythingby profits and losses. Thus we can negate and devalue people if theydon't create profits. If we judge everything by our hammer, which isthe profits/losses, then everything looks like a nail which in this caseis the question of profits/losses, the GDP, (Gross domestic product)wealth...……….If we stop looking at everything through the paradigm of profits, the hammer of profits, then we can reevaluate, better understand the world....For that hammer of wealth/profits is a false vision of the world... it is an artificial vision of what the world looks like...…..

We judge, value, understand ourselves in terms of profits and losses. what a lack of imagination we have, to see ourselves in such nihilistic terms. We can no longer have this lack this imagination and short change who we are because offers us a false picture of who we are.

who I am and what is possible for me is not dependent upon any standardof wealth that I have or might have...…. who I am and what is possible for me exists within a different context outside of profits and losses.

Or if you see the world in the context of racial or sexual or gender identities,then everything you see, the hammer is that context. If you see white identity as the context for things, then that is your hammer and when you use that hammer,everything looks like a white identity problem. That is lack of a imagination at work.

Change your vision, your hammer of the world and everything changes. Here we become aware of another great problem of our age, the lack of imagination. We are trapped because we lack the imagination to escape our viewpoints...…

Kropotkin

"Those who sacrifice liberty for securitywind up with neither." "Ben Franklin"

The continuity of life plays role in our lives. I was on vacation last weekand even though I wasn't there, the store continued on, as it does whether I am there or not. Life is the same way. It is impossible to understand life without understanding the continuity of life. We are born within this continuity and life continues within this continuity. To be or not to be, still exist within the continuation of life.

Now conservatives use this continuity as a justification for their ideologywhich is basically, this continuity of life, of society, is the basis for all the goodthings in life. A conservative values and believes in this continuity that is our existence. But the problem of continuity is simple, it makesno value judgment about the continuity of the life. For example, if we baseour existence on the continuity instead of the nature of what is being continued, thenwe have our justification for such things as slavery, women being barefoot, pregnant and in the kitchen, of political systems like the monarchy and notdemocracy. For it is the modern world attack upon the continuity ofthese institutions that has lead to the modern world as we know it.

To simply continue things because that is the way that they have alwaysbeen done is the carrying of the age old myths, biases, prejudices, habitsand superstitions into the modern world and into today. We cannot simplybe engaged in the act of maintaining our continuity instead of understand as we have what is being continued. This is the difference between the liberal and the conservative. For the conservative, it is about the continuationand not necessarily what is being continued and for the liberal, it is aboutwhat is being conserved, what is being continued that matters, not the act of continuation. The second aspect is the speed of any change that mightbe made. For the conservative, speed matters and if one is to conservative,maintain our continuity, then it must change slowly if at all.

for the liberal, change cannot come fast enough. But once again, it is notabout the continuity itself, but what is being continued. And if what is beingcontinued is considered "wrong" by the liberal, then change cannot come fastenough. Let us take one example, slavery. Slavery has existed since the beginningof time and is mentioned within the bible. So in the eyes of the conservative, slavery is acceptable because it is the continuity of existence that allows society and the culture to survive. It is not about what is being continued,just as long as it is being continued. But slavery is wrong and the soonerwe can removed it, eliminate it, the better off we are, that is the liberal thinking. It doesn't matter about the continuity or the speed of change,as long as the necessary change occurs to help those who are in the bondsof slavery. For those who wonder, slavery is still practiced in the world.We are not as advanced as we like to think.

So, what about continuity that appeals or doesn't appeal to you? What do you want to continue and what do you want to change?And the liberal ask, why? Why continue this and why change that. It is not enough to engage in change but to understand whatchange we want and why.

Kropotkin

"Those who sacrifice liberty for securitywind up with neither." "Ben Franklin"

Note the "common" sense idea's of society that fall apart upon examination. Idea's like "Truth, Justice and the American way of life"

I grew up upon the phrase "Truth, Justice and the American way of life". But upon reflection, what exactly does this mean?

"Truth". What is "Truth"?????????? That which confirms our understanding of life,or said another way, that which confirms our myths, biases, prejudices, ism's and superstitions that we are indoctrinated with, in our childhood.

And what of Justice? What does Justice mean? Plato engaged in this 2,500 years ago and we have gotten no further then him. I have definedJustice as equality and we clearly don't have equality in our justice system,so we don't have justice in America. What does Justice mean in modern America?

and the American way of life? There isn't a person in America who can explain to me what is the "American way of life". It is all empty words and phrases thatmean nothing. An honest examination of these and other prejudices and "buzz" wordsshow us the emptiness of our words and the emptiness of the "American way of life".

You want to get to the emptiness and apathy and nihilism of us Americans, you must first get to the heart of our alienation from America and that lies in the deep and vast separation between our ideals and the reality of those ideal's.

"We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal"

And our words, vastly differ from our laws and our actions and who we claim to be. The alienation between who we claim to be and who we actually are, has leadus to an emptiness of soul and heart of American's today.

It is this disconnect between the words of our public monuments and our actions that has lead us to, in part, to the fragmentation of the modern soul. We are clearly leading fragmented lives/ souls and we cannot continue, as the conservativewants, to continue as if nothing has happened to who we are and who we want to be.

But this is the problem with our going from here to there in regards to who we areand who we aspire to be, because we see and feel and are alienated from that which we claim to be and that which we are. We cannot become who we are,if we are alienated between the words of our claims and the truth of our reality, of ouractions. We say, we are honest, and we lie and we say, we are just, and we are anythingbut just, and we say, we are truthful, but we are engaged in deceit and lies and following the footsteps of our so called "leaders" who lie and engage in deceit andengage in dissembling their motives and beliefs.

A dishonest person, an American will say, "not me, I am truthful. It is everyone elsewho is lying" but the fact is, concealing is the new America. Hiding the truth, hiding justice, hiding honesty is the new America. The new America is a sham, an act, an masquerade posing as honesty and truth and Justice and the American way of life, with everyone denying their involvement with injustice and dishonestyand their involvement in deceit and dissembling the truth.

IQ45 is not a anomaly, but the quintessential American. "we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men lie and cheat and hide the truth" That is the America of 2018.

It is not common sense that has taken a beating in modern America, butthe truth and honesty that has suffered a beating.

What have you done today to be truthful and honest and to pursue justiceas equality, not as justice being bought and paid for?

Kropotkin

"Those who sacrifice liberty for securitywind up with neither." "Ben Franklin"

The search for philosophy is not a search for philosophy as a science, but philosophy as a search for the truth. Science is about facts, philosophy is about the why. There are no facts in say, Kant's "Critique of Pure Reason" or in Nietzsche "Thus Spoke Zarathustra" or in Plato's "Republic".

To turn philosophy into a science means you need tohave some philosophical facts. What would constitute a philosophical fact? That all men search for happiness? Or that we exist to search for knowledge? Or that we try to understand the "meaning of life"? There are no "facts" in these statements.

The point of philosophy is to understand what it means to be human and we don't need facts to understand what it meansto be human. Understood correctly, literature can answer the questionof what it means to be human as well as philosophy does and sometimeseven better. Literature can educate us to the possibilities of being humanin ways that philosophy cannot and why? Because of the interaction between characters reveals to us the possibilities of being human in ways andlanguage that is understandable whereas philosophy confounds us inthe understanding of what it means to be human because of the obscureand esoteric language use of philosophers. The search for our understanding of what it means to be human doesn't have to be guided by obscure languageand convoluted sentences as in Kant and Hegel and Wittgenstein and Heidegger. The prose to philosophical understanding can be a clear and open as the language of Hemingway and Goethe and Shakespeare. In fact, I would suggestthat the greatest philosopher of all time is really Shakespeare becausehe was the first to alert us to the possibilities of being human and the Bildungsromanof Goethe brought to light the developmental nature of the human being. We are not static machines, but creatures with adaptable and changable nature that progresses over the years. The truth is trying to find the truthof human nature, of the answer to who we are is difficult because of the changing nature of the human soul. I am different today then I was 5 or 10 or 20 years ago. Partly because I am older today and partly becauseof events and people who have changed me, but who is the real me? The me of 10 years ago or the me of today? I suggest that both are partof me and the answer lies with the fact that we humans change and adaptand progress with time. It is that change and adaptation that messeswith any understanding of what it means to be human because we are in constant state of process from one day to the next to the next andto the next day. The human soul is in a constant state of flux and that fluxmakes it next to impossible to us to fix our understanding of what it means to behuman. Any account of what it means to be human and what are our possibilities must take into account our soul as it changes and adaptsand continues of process from one day to the next.

I am Kropotkin..... but what that means has changed over the years. Philosophy must learn to accomadate that change and constant flux of being human. And philosophy must learn to do that withclear and graceful langauge.

Kropotkin

"Those who sacrifice liberty for securitywind up with neither." "Ben Franklin"

The changing question of what it means to be human and its possibilities are also a question of what itmeans to the relationship between individuals and the state. This question of the relationship between the state and the individual lies at the heart of the Greek understanding of what it meansto be human for the Greeks understand the question of becoming human in terms of the polis, the city. It was not an individual question of how to becomehuman but a societal question, a question involving the entire society, not just the individual.

Today, we have a mixed understanding of what it means to become human because of our mixed attitude toward the state. Is the state really the enemy of people as Ronal Raygun said it was,or is the state really an agent of change in people or is the statejust an umpire that doesn't dictate change at all, it simply stands as an umpire does in a game of football. Once we answer the question of what is the role of government in the lives of people,then we shall have some progress in what it means to becomehuman.

Kropotkin

"Those who sacrifice liberty for securitywind up with neither." "Ben Franklin"

It is not a question of our understanding human existenceas being a static, unchanging existence, but a questionof the ever changing, ever moving nature of human existencethat we must understand...… It is the change of human existencethat we must begin to understand, not the static nature of human existence.

Kropotkin

"Those who sacrifice liberty for securitywind up with neither." "Ben Franklin"

As a philosopher, one who is attempting an inquiry into the nature of things,I must have some place where I begin...…

therefore, I begin here...… I do not believe in god or an metaphysicalnotion that there are things beyond the physical. What is, is in the known and seen universe. It has been said that there is such stuff asdark matter and dark energy but we cannot see it...… I say, we can'tsee it yet. We just haven't created the tools we need to see or measuresuch things as dark matter or dark energy. Our scientific growth hascome because we have created tools that allow us to expand the use ofour senses with such devices as a telescope and microscope and antennasand particle accelerators....It is the use of and growth in such tools that has allowed us to gather a greater understanding of the universe andthe forces or laws of the universe. We have such human tools as logicand science and mathematics that allows us gather information aboutthe nature of and reality of the universe we live in.If you want a definition of a human being, it might be this, a human beingis a tool using animal.

It is the rise of modern science which has created our modern world. Science measures, weighs, counts, analysis matter, forces, time/space....in other words, if it can be studied and measured, it is science and scienceuses those tools of science to measure and weigh and count...…

The question of science is about the who, what, when, where, how butand this is important, not the why. Using the tools of science we can buildan atomic bomb but science cannot tell us if the use of the atomic bombis a "good" or a "bad" thing. That is the role of philosophy. But one may ask,why isn't it the role of religion? Because Religion takes into account evidence that isn't really there... In other words, in a court of law,the trial of a person, the court would introduce the evidence of a crimeand that evidence must be physical evidence, paper work, a gun or a knife,tax documents and if the evidence is a person who has knowledge of the crime, it cannot be the sole evidence of a crime. In other words,we must conclusively connect the person who is being charged with a crimeto the evidence of a crime. let us return to the role of religion. For the evidence a religious person needs to prove there is existence of a god, the evidence is not physical evidence. The religious person accepts non physical evidence that a courtof law would not accept. You cannot prove that a god existsand no court in the universe would accept that evidence becausethere is no physical evidence connecting god to the physical universe. a person saying in a court of law, I believe this is true and that makesit true would not be accepted in a court of law as evidence of a crime orany type of connection to a crime. simple belief is not enough of a connectionto be accepted in a court of law...….. and that is how I judge evidence forsomething. Would it be acceptable in a court of law? If I hold this belief,is there enough physical evidence to have this belief as holding truein a court of law? In other words, my burden of proof is very high.I cannot hold a belief if there is not enough supporting physical evidence forthat belief.

so in my inquiry, I can hold a belief if there is enough evidence that holds true in a court of law. So I hold the belief that there are UFO'S because I believe that there is enough physical evidence to bring into a courtof law and that evidence can be used to show that UFO'S exists.

But there isn't enough physical evidence to show us that a god or gods, exists.

We have enough physical evidence to show that black holes existsand that time/space are a physical entity. That time/space is notjust a mathematical concept but a physical one like the planetearth is physical evidence that planets do exists.

We have evidence that time/energy/matter/mass all havea beginning in the big bang and thus have a ending date atsome point in the future but and this is important, that the amount of matter/energy created in the big bangis still the same amount of matter/energy that exists today and will be the same amount of matter at the end of existence.

so how we will be able to explain the ending of the universein light of the fact that the amount of energy/matter in the universewill be the exactly the same from beginning to end?

This is done by entropy. a decline into disorder from order.Order exists because of the amount of energy that is in the systemor put into a system allows the system to maintain order. Once a system doesn't have enough energy to maintain itself,it begins its decline into disorder. The amount of energy a systemneeds changes as the system changes. A political system in the beginning phases of it operation needs a different amount of energy then during it middle phase and a different amount during it ending phase. At our current phase of existence we need more energy to maintainour existence and yet, people try to increase disorder by removing energy that goes into the system. That is done byremoving the energy a system needs to sustain and build itself.

a political system does this by money which allows a system to maintain itself and the amount of energy that goes into a system. so if we understand that a system needs an ever greater amount of energy to maintain itself because a system becomes ever greatermore complicated. So the energy needed to maintain the Americanpolitical system was less during the 18the century and then everycentury thereafter the amount of energy needed increased justmaintain itself. A large system needs ever greater energy then a smallersystem to maintain itself and the energy a political system needs is twofold, participation and money. A reduction in either type of energy,participation and money into a political system increases the disorderinto a system.

To truly understand the modern world, we must understand systems and the energy that goes into the modern systems thatmakes the systems work.

this is some of what I hold to be true.

Kropotkin

"Those who sacrifice liberty for securitywind up with neither." "Ben Franklin"

If we hold ourselves to the higher standardof it must eligible as evidence in a court of law, then much of philosophy gets tossed into the garbage heap.

an example of this is Kant and his famous saying:

"Two things fill the mind with ever new and increasing admirationand awe, the more often and steadily we reflect upon them: the starry heavens above me and the moral law within me"

OK, we have evidence for the starry heavens above butthe "moral law within me"? Nah, that is an assumption of facts not admissible in a court of law. There is simply noevidence of any kind of a moral law in Kant, in you, in me,in anybody.

We see this false attempt to act upon evidence that we simplydon't have. The group after Kant, which included Fichte, Shelling, Schleiermacher, and of course, Hegel, all began with unproven assumptions not admissible in a court of law. Each of them wrote about assumptions like the "divine absolute" which is another name for god, and the existenceof some sort of spirit which infuses "the People" which causes "the people" to act in some fashion. Each of those named above writes about the "Spirit of the people", the "German Spirit" as if it actually were a thing andnot some made up metaphysical thing. You have to stick to the facts as theypresent themselves, not as how you want them to appear. This is the failureof "German Idealism" during the period of Kant and thereafter. They assumedfacts not in evidence.

So what other "facts" that we have that are assumed and not actually proven? The idea of "progress" is one. We have no evidence that the human race is supposedto travel the path of "progress". From the lower, simplerto the higher, complicated level. There is simply no evidencefor this idea. It is assumed that because we have a higher levelof technology, that we are "higher" or further along withpath of "progress". But this idea of "progress" assumes thatthat there is some liner progression involved and we see no evidencefor that. I would suggest that the Greeks were higher then us in area's likephilosophy and ethics, and we are higher in science and technology. so the question really becomes, we have "progress" in what exact area's and depending upon that area, we may or may not have "progressed". It depends upon how you define "progress"? The entire question of "progress"revolves around how you define "progress". The question of "progress" and other questions, really operate within the boundaries of your definition andthus have no basis for being admissible in a court of law as being "facts". As I stated, much of what passes for philosophy gets tossedwhen judged upon being facts or being judge as opinion.So we have statements like this, "The creative spirit of the peoplehelp create democracy" Ok, there is no evidence of a collective creative spirit of the people. We have individuals who are creativeand they do create. Am I such a creative person? Hell no.We cannot take an individual property such as creativity or socialness and assume that it is a collective process,includes everyone. My sisters are creative, my brother and I,nope, so does the entire family have a "creative spirit"? some do and some don't, it is not a collective thing. Now I could say, my family has a "creative spirit"and I would be partly right, and I would be partly wrong.depending on who I was talking about.

We have to speak and write with the current evidence, facts in mind.Thus we cannot make blanket statements about "everyone" or the "collective" spirit, or the "absolute" spirit which is god. "I believe in god" is a personal, individual statement which some in my family believes. "I don't believe in god" is a personal, individual statement which some in my family believes. So is therea collective understanding or a collective spirit about god in my family? Not that I can tell.

We have to be careful about making individual, personal statements that we falsely attribute to a "collective spirit" or a "collective understanding".

My statement "I believe in UFO'S" is a personal, individual statement,but I can present evidence, evidence that is acceptable in a court of law,that UFO"S exist.

a Statement that "I believe in GOD" is a personal, individual statement,but I could not present evidence that would be acceptable in a court of law.

Why? because the evidence for a god is mostly faith based, not evidencebased. I have faith that god exists whereas I don't need faith for the evidencefor UFO'S. Philosophy must be presented upon evidence based, not faith base. We must have evidence for our philosophical statements. Enough evidence for a court of law.

Kropotkin

"Those who sacrifice liberty for securitywind up with neither." "Ben Franklin"

sometimes I think we forget the order of things and it isgood to get a refresher occasionally.

I am old, 59, and so I look at things with old eyes.....I see an experience and I try to find an explanation fromthe varied examples of experiences I have. I see a man die from a heartattack. From my prior experiences, I know what has happened and what it means for me. My experiences have supplied me with informationabout what those experiences like a heart attack means.

But when I was young, an experience like watching a man have a heartattack, was new and confusing. I didn't know or understood what it meant in general or specifically to me, to watch someone have a heart attack. It would have been a confusing experience for mebecause I didn't have the experience or knowledge to know what it means to have a heart attack.

Now let us go even further back into time, when I was young,maybe 9 or 10, my sister and I witnessed my father having a stroke. We had no idea what was happening. Frankly, we panicked.My sister ran next door and got a neighbor, a nurse, to comeover and take care of my dad. Now being so young, we had no experiences with people having strokes or heart attacks andwe had no idea what to do. We didn't have enough experienceto make sense of what had happened or what to do. We knewsomething was wrong but we didn't know what. Now that I amold, I can pretty tell if something is wrong and because of mypast experiences, I can often tell what the problem is and whatthe solution to that problem is.......

Now that I old, I can give experiences some context. From what istotally unknown, my father's stroke, to today where I knowand understand the context of a stroke or a heart attack. I can place or put into context, a single experience within lifetime of my experiences. I now know that a heart attack isa natural event that happens for quite often no real reason to people.sometimes the live, sometimes they don't. I can place into context suchexperiences as strokes and heart attacks and divorce and births and deaths. Such is the understanding of life that happens when you are 59. There are not a whole lot of mysteries when you are 59. You have seen itall, you have done it all, you have been it all. The only mystery leftat age 59 is death and someday, I too will undergo that experience.

The point and value of philosophy and science and religion is to explain what experiences mean. I can philosophically explain what death means to me and I can scientifically explain what death meansand I can religiously explain what death means. Science, philosophy and religionare all means to explain and understand experiences. Now some experiences are unexplainable because the event/experience is random, chaotic and thus cannot be explained in either scientific or philosophic or religious terms. The experience lies outside of the usual explanations we offer up for such things.

What is god? We can try to offer up scientific or philosophical or religious explanations to, what is god? I can use my vast experience, old age,to help me and you, understand what is god and what does that experience explain to us or offer to us. I have learned that having a god helps us to.....or I have learned that not having a god helps us to...…..depends on my experience as to what my understanding of experiencesare. I have experienced a lot, so I know a lot... is pretty much how it works.

Now what philosophers try to do is to understand those experiences all humanshave of life and death and illness and loss and turn them into some explanation. We have some philosophers who try to turn experiences into a system, byderiving all experiences systematically from one fundamental principle.Thus we have Nietzsche who tried to do this with his "will to power" He thus understood all experiences from this one principle of "will to power" and that was his "system".

Now we have had people who have tried to systematically turn experiencesinto a fundamental principle by saying, "it is all god's will" and everythingis understood to happen by "god's will". then we attempt to work out whatit means for us humans if everything is and all our experiences are simplepart of "god's will". What does that mean for us humans?

We have also people who have tried to understand experiences in termsof natural forces and actions. We call these people scientist. They try tosystematically understand experiences in light of natural forces and experiences. We drop dead because of genetics or bad habits like smokingand no exercise. The question of how we explain the world, how we understandthe world comes from our understanding the world of the world and ourexperiences of the world. Our understanding of the world couldbe scientific or philosophic or religious or some combination of all three.

So the question really is, by what method do you understand the world? How do you understand and explain the experiences of the world? How do you create context in your own mind with experiences ofyour own life?

Think about how we understand experiences and how we engagein creating context and understanding of those experiences.

that is the entire reason and rational of science and philosophy andreligion. To explain and understand experiences.

so how do you explain and understand experiences?

Kropotkin

"Those who sacrifice liberty for securitywind up with neither." "Ben Franklin"

To keep it along the same lines as the last post, I shall usebasic experiences to help us understand.

I am born. I am born into a family and a city, a tribe or a group of people.We are born into a already set understanding of the world whichis knowledge, superstitions, prejudice, habit, myths, in which we usethose things, knowledge, superstitions...…. to explain the world and its experiences.

I am born. to ask what it means to be a human being, being born isreligious and philosophical. How we are born is scientific. What it means to be born a white, American male in 1959 is a task Ihave engaged with my whole life. Have I overcome my childhoodindoctrinations, myths, habits, prejudices is the question?

What have my experiences over the last 59 years taught me aboutwhat it means to be born human, in this time and this place. What does it mean to have been born with those childhoodindoctrinations and superstitions and myths and prejudices?

I was born with some myths but not other myths.... I was not bornwith the myth or prejudice that white people are better then blackpeople. I was raised to be tolerant of those who hold idea's, beliefs, myths and prejudices different then what I hold

as I grew older, I began to become aware of, to begin the process of knowing thyself and I discovered that the beliefs I held were not my beliefs but beliefs of my family, my race, my culture.... but they weren't my beliefs,I was indoctrinated with those beliefs.

I began the engagement of overcoming my beliefs with a rigid and complete understanding of what I believe and why. I engagedwith overcoming my childhood beliefs and myths and prejudices....and in overcoming my indoctrinations, I discovered that I becamewho I was. Now I held values and beliefs that matched who I was....That is what it means to become who you are..... you discover the values and beliefs that really define who you are.....and part of that is the value of experiences.... I use my experiences to help guide me in discovering who I am and overcoming childhoodindoctrinations and myths and...…..

experiences help guide us to discovering who I really amand who I ought to become. It is experiences that showus the path to overcoming ourselves and experiences thatshow us who we really are...…

I owe, I owe, off to work I go..... and off to work I go....

Kropotkin

"Those who sacrifice liberty for securitywind up with neither." "Ben Franklin"